direptor

Forms

dīreptor m (genitive dīreptōris); third declension^[1]

Etymology

It is from Latin dīripiō (“to tear apart, plunder”) + -tor,^[2][3][4] the agent noun of that verb, which is a compound of dis- and rapiō (“to seize”).^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

Cicero has it first,^[6] for a plunderer: he asks whether Antonius was the guardian of the city or its plunderer and harasser, and speaks of the plunderers of his own goods.^[3][7]

Semantic evolution

Lewis and Short call it very rare.^[7] Besides Cicero's plunderers, Tacitus uses it of men who seize people by force: a girl or a handsome youth who fell into their hands was torn apart by the seizers and drove them to destroy each other.^[3] Ambrose lists thieves, plunderers and innkeepers together, and Gregory of Tours, who spells it dereptor, writes of a savage ravisher.^[3] A feminine direptrix is found in Hesychius of Jerusalem.^[3] It appears in the early medieval law codes of the Bavarians and the Visigoths.^[6]

Timeline

• 81–43 BC – Cicero uses it in the Philippics and against Catiline.^[3][7][6]
• 98–115 AD – Tacitus uses it of men who seize by force.^[3][6]
• c. 340–397 AD – Ambrose names plunderers among thieves.^[3][6]
• 538/539–594 AD – Gregory of Tours uses it of a ravisher.^[3][6]
• 7th century – The law of the Visigoths uses it.^[6]
• before 743 – The law of the Bavarians uses it.^[6]

Meanings

Noun

1. A plunderer, pillager.^[2][7]
2. One who seizes by force, a ravisher.^[3]

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Thesaurus linguae Latinae (1900–), Leipzig: Teubner; Berlin: De Gruyter; open-access ed., Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften
4. ^ Georges, Karl Ernst (1913–1918), Ausführliches lateinisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch, 8th ed., ed. Heinrich Georges, Hannover; Leipzig: Hahn
5. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
6. ^ a b c d e f g h Köbler, Gerhard (2010), Lateinisches Abkunfts- und Wirkungswörterbuch für Altertum und Mittelalter, online ed., koeblergerhard.de
7. ^ a b c d Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press